Starter

This is an old post from January 8th 2013.


"If there's a need to try WoW out, it's always better to try the starter version than play on a friends account. With starter you get a free account that you can upgrade to a better one later. Playing a friends account can get your friend banned and if you ever want to upgrade and play 4realz the characters you've made are left behind. Unless you can make your friend pay 20€ for the transfer and I think that's when it's on sale.

Starter is how it's named, get you starting. It's also free for a reason. It includes a lot of restrictions, some of them just mainly trying to block the goldseller from using free accounts. I made a list here of all the restrictions:

- level cap at 20, after which you get gold from all the quests and not XP
- not able to use auction house
- can't join a guild or form one
- can't use realID or b-tag
- over 20 levels higher players can't see your /say (this is very nasty especially for RP'ers) this is information that is not shared by Blizzard, so we ended up testing it
- you can only whisper to those who have whispered you or have added you on their friend list
- you can't form a party, but you can join one
- you can't trade that means no mail
- maximum of 10 gold
- no use of the global channels

But:
- free to play to level 20
- no talent, skill or any that kind of restrictions
-  all the classes and races available to try except the last expansions
- dungeons, bg's and even with the random feature
- riding available and enough moneycap to buy a mount
- the characters will remain after upgrading

In battlegrounds you are stuck with the lvl24 twinks and that can be pretty unmotivational but PvP is won by skill, not with levels. A starter can twink some too and practise makes purrfect. I've heard whining how it's so unfair that the starters are put with the paying players that has advantage but I think it's only fair for the gamemakers to favour the paying customers. I don't see why would those who play free should have bracket of their own when they have locked their XP by choosing not to pay. WoW costs about 15€ and that includes the basic game and first two expansions and also a month of gametime. That makes the level cap to be 80 and that's a lot to play with very little money. Only Cata and MoP has to be bought separately and of course gametime that's about 10€/month.

More information about starter here.

Happy hunting!"

Some of these things are already outdated but I don't have more current knowledge about them. I think Cata is now included in the basic pack. It'll be cheap very soon when WoD comes out.

Feel free to comment if you have more current information about starter accounts!